


It's Dark In Here

by songofdefiance



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: BAMF Leta Lestrange, Fix-It, Gen, Imprisonment, Post-Movie 2: Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald, Spoilers, Wandless Magic, mentions of torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-29
Updated: 2018-11-29
Packaged: 2019-09-02 01:56:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16777324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/songofdefiance/pseuds/songofdefiance
Summary: Leta shrugs.  “Apparently, I’m too important to kill.”





	It's Dark In Here

**Author's Note:**

> I'm mad.
> 
> Warning for mentions of torture (use of the Cruciatus curse, specifically), though it's only once.

The darkness could mean anything. It’s the pain that’s a giveaway.

Were it not for the pain, Leta might have thought she was dead. Instead, she has aches from trying to sleep on the cold, hard ground, and her muscles are sore from whatever spell Grindelwald hit her with. She was so sure that her defiance had meant her death, and yet here she is.

Maybe if she was with Theseus instead, it wouldn’t feel like a curse.

Time doesn’t have much meaning down here, but every so often the torches will ignite and a house-elf will bring her meals. They aren’t terrible meals, but they aren’t ideal either - usually flavorless gruel and a hunk of bread. She eats slowly, because so far eating is the only thing she can think of to pass the time.

The first time the torches light up, she takes in as many details as she can. She’s in a small cell. The floor and the walls are made of some kind of black stone, rather like the Ministry. She has just enough time to glimpse the empty cell across from hers before the lights go out again.

It takes her three more meals to figure out that none of the cells within view are occupied. It’s only after that that Leta attempts to call out. She isn’t surprised when no one responds; even if someone else is here, there are probably silencing charms keeping her from communicating with them. 

The darkness is welcoming, at first. When she tries to sleep all she can see is the blinding blue of Grindelwald’s flames. She still feels the searing pain from when he pointed his wand at her, convinced that she’s dying all over again. Waking to the dark, and the cold, is a relief after that.

It doesn’t last long, though.

Mealtimes are the only way she has of keeping track of time, so she starts to count them. She thinks there have been about 15 since she arrived. Aside from the house-elf, she’s had no visitors. 

That changes after 30 meals.

The torches light up earlier than expected. Leta blinks rapidly to let her eyes adjust, and scrambles to her feet when she hears near-silent footsteps approaching. She’s not sure what she’s expecting - Rosier, maybe, come to torture her. From what Theseus has told her, that woman has a nasty disposition.

It’s not Rosier, though. It’s Credence Barebone.

He’s still hunched over. Still moving carefully, like he expects to be yelled at for putting one foot out of place. Leta suppresses a bitter smile at that. She knows, maybe better than anyone, how long it will take before he rids himself of that habit.

He stares at her for a few moments, then says, “I didn’t know they were keeping you down here.”

Leta shrugs. “Apparently, I’m too important to kill.”

She doesn’t know why, and waiting to find out has her on edge. 

“He didn’t tell me why.” Credence keeps staring. “He... deflected. He does that a lot.”

Leta doesn’t have to ask who “he” is.

“Did you get what you wanted from him?” she asks. “Has he told you who you are?”

Her eyes travel to the wand sticking out of his pocket. Credence follows her gaze, and is quick to step back from the bars.

“I shouldn’t be talking to you,” he mutters. He dumps a pile of clothes on the floor and shoves them beneath the bars, into her cell. “These are for you. Fur-lined. It gets cold here at night.”

He hurries away before she can say thank you. She changes into the clothes in darkness, letting out a sigh of relief at how much warmer they are than her silk dress. 

(She should have known better. The warmth only makes the nightmares worse.)

* * *

It occurs to her, about 35 meals in, that Theseus and Newt probably believe her to be dead. Which means they aren’t coming for her. Which means she’s on her own.

She starts practicing wandless magic, after that. She can’t affect anything outside of her cell, but inside it she practices moving the utensils from her meal trays around. It takes nine meals before she can shift the fork even a little, feeling the cold metal just barely drag across her palm. 

The effort always leaves her exhausted, and when she sleeps she has the nightmares again. Sometimes she’ll wake up gasping, and find herself tearing off both layers of her robes just so that she can feel the cool air of her skin. It’s in those moments that she’s grateful for the darkness once again.

Eventually, however, she discovers that her magic is at its most potent after the nightmares, when her mind is whirling with emotions and she can channel her rage and helplessness. It’s almost therapeutic, when she’s able to send the knife flying into the wall opposite her with a slashing motion. 

At 45 meals, Credence is back. He’s not alone this time.

She doesn’t know the blond woman, but the blond woman seems to know her. “It’s not Credence anymore, sweetie,” she tells Leta, the moment Leta sees them both. “His name’s Aurelius. I’m Queenie, Queenie Goldstein.”

Goldstein. The auror that Newt is sweet on. 

Queenie smiles sadly. “Yeah, they’re a bit sappy.”

It takes Leta all of five seconds to slam down her Occlumency shields. She sees Queenie jerk in surprise, notices Credence glance sideways at her. She knows that whatever Queenie is sensing now isn’t fun for her - Leta’s shields have always been more like a miasma than a wall.

“Oh, you’re  _ good _ ,” Queenie breathes. She turns to Credence. “We’re gonna have to get Vinda involved. I’ll just send her down, okay?”

Credence isn’t fast enough to mask the panicked look that appears on his face as Queenie leaves. Leta sees it, chuckles, and says, “That bad?”

He shakes himself, hardens his gaze. “It’ll be fine if you just answer her questions.”

And Vinda Rosier has a lot of questions.

How much do the Scamanders care about her? How did they get ahold of Grindelwald’s pendant? Just how powerful is Newt Scamander? How close is he to Albus Dumbledore? Did Dumbledore tell her to destroy Grindelwald’s hookah? Where did she learn Occlumency? Has Dumbledore ever entrusted her with anything that might bring down Grindelwald?

Leta laughs, and laughs and laughs, even though there are tears of pain streaming down her cheeks. She wonders, distantly, if Rosier knows that she’s giving Leta more information than she’s getting back. She now knows that Grindelwald is borderline-obsessed with Dumbledore, and seems to have a healthy amount of fear of him. What’s more, they have nothing to hold against her. Theseus and Newt will be back in England, and if Dumbledore is there, then Grindelwald won’t be.

Credence is there the entire time, watching her and cringing every time Rosier uses the Cruciatus Curse. Leta is careful not to make eye contact with him. He lingers after Rosier leaves, crouching down in front of her cell. Leta is lying in a boneless heap, still struggling to catch her breath. Still laughing, a bit.

“You asked me, last time,” he says, quietly. “If he told me who I am.”

Leta breathes out, and turns her head so that she can look at him.

“I’m Aurelius Dumbledore,” he says. “I’m... I’m Albus Dumbledore’s brother.”

Leta laughs again. “Just like that?” she asks. “Grindelwald just... knows this, somehow. When no one else did. With the way you grew up, are you really that willing to believe a word that comes out of the mouth of someone like him?”

Credence rears back as though he’s been slapped. “He’s been kind to me - “ he argues.

“And I’m sure he will continue to be so,” Leta interrupts, curling her mouth into a smirk. “Until you’re not useful to him anymore. You want my advice? You have a name to go on. Now run. Run, find someone else who might know about the Dumbledores, and ask them instead. The price he’ll ask might be too high.”

Credence’s hands are shaking. “I can’t. Albus is trying to kill me.”

“And I suppose Grindelwald told you that, too.”

Credence’s eyes are starting to turn white. Leta watches this with a curious feeling of dispassion. She’s prepared when Credence dissolves into a storm of darkness, her magic encasing her in a bubble as he surrounds her. He doesn’t seem to be trying to hurt her, but she appreciates that her magic has decided to cooperate, for now.

He rages through the rest of the cells, instead. Leta listens to the sound of bars being ripped from stone, and watches as chunks of mortar go flying. Eventually there are shouts, and she sees Grindelwald himself come into view. 

“Credence, my boy,” he calls. “Let go.”

Credence is slow to reform, but it’s enough time for Leta to disperse her own magic before Grindelwald notices. She does so just in time - the moment Credence is back in human form, Grindelwald turns his mismatched eyes on her, regarding her with an unreadable look. 

_ Come in here, _ she thinks.  _ I’ll burn you the way you burned me. _

She wonders if he’s a Legilimens. Likely not as strong as Queenie, but it wouldn’t surprise her if he was. She wonders if he was able to see that thought flitting across the surface of her mind. 

He chooses to ignore it, instead guiding Credence away from her cell with an arm around his shoulders. Leta wants to laugh at their retreating backs, but caution keeps her silent.

When her cell is plunged into darkness again, sleep pulls her under.

* * *

Credence is back, sooner that she expected, given his outburst.

“I’m not supposed to be down here,” he admits, staring at his shoes. 

Leta, who was woken up by the torches, blinks at him. She’s propped up against the wall, which she has found is the most comfortable way to sleep. The light ripped her from her nightmare, and without the darkness providing its usual relief, she had a few moments of panic. She’s past them now, thankfully.

“Then why did you come?” she asks.

“To apologize,” he forces out. “I’m... I thought I was past losing control. I hate that I did. I hate that I could’ve hurt you.” He glances up at her. “You were nice to me. Even though you... you’re not my sister, but you were kind.”

Leta smiles ruefully. “We spoke for all of five minutes. For all you know, I could be a nightmare.”

Credence shakes his head. “I don’t think so.”

Leta thinks about the magic that she’s now able to feel, humming under her skin. It’s like the anger that simmered within her for so many years. The resentment. How on some days, when the loneliness is worse, the anger is what she clings to. 

She hated that, before this. Now, she wonders if her anger is all that stands between her and despair, in here.

“Thank you for saying that,” she says.

Credence nods.

“I’ve done bad things, too,” he says, quickly. “I just - I felt like you should know. Some people have told me it was an accident. But other people told me that I did it on purpose, and they say that like it was a good thing. I’m not sure if I believe them.”

Leta’s not sure what he’s talking about, but she doesn’t need to know. “Trying to tell someone else what their intentions were is a slippery slope,” she says. For some reason, her conversation with Dumbledore springs to mind. “In the end, you’re the only one who can say for sure.”

“What about you?” he asks.

Leta smiles ruefully. “It was an accident,” she says. “But knowing that and feeling it aren’t quite the same thing.”

* * *

Leta loses count of the meals that pass before she gets her next visitor. They seem content to let her stew in isolation, which (after Rosier’s visit) suits her just fine. The nightmares get murkier, more vague, and she succeeds in creating a little ball of light in her cell. 

She lets it dance on her fingertips, sends it up and down her cell. Attempting to float it outside the bars means that it’s extinguished immediately, but she doesn’t mind having to keep it confined to her cell. Eventually, after five minutes of hard concentration, she’s able to summon a second ball of light, and she makes them chases each other around in the air above her.

It doesn’t take her long to realize that she has something of a gift for wandless magic, and wonders why she never bothered to find out if she could use it before. She’s fairly certain that this level of aptitude isn’t normal. Her spells have always been a bit more powerful, a bit more potent, but she put it down to her wand. She’d been told it was a powerful wand when it chose her.

“There’s a fire in you that matches the fire in this wand,” the wandmaker told her.

The first time she summons the blue flames from her nightmares, she laughs again.

She’s careful to hide her abilities from the house-elf. She keeps her Occlumency shields up at all times, in the hopes that Queenie doesn’t realize what she’s doing. She gets no visitors, and is glad of it.

Until Aurelius is back.

Her eating utensils are circling above her head when the torches ignite, and with a wave of her hand she settles them back on her tray. They make a faint clattering noise as they land, but Aurelius doesn’t seem to notice.

“They’re talking about replacing you.”

He has a wild look in his eye, and Leta’s heart grows cold as she digests his words. 

“You mean...”

“They’re going to disguise Vinda,” he says hollowly. “As you. And send her to England. They’re counting on the Scamanders to be too ‘overcome’ to do any proper checks on her.”

Leta feels like a statue. It was one thing when it was just her captivity to contend with. But the thought of Vinda Rosier wearing her  _ face _ , kissing Theseus, maybe even marrying him, if she’s playing the long game - 

It takes everything she has not to throw up.

She notices that Aurelius is trembling. With fear this time, rather than anger. “It’s what Grindelwald did to Percival Graves,” he says. “He - he stole his  _ life _ , just so that he could get to me, and when I thought about him doing the same thing to you I just - I had to tell you. You deserve to know. You’re better than  _ Vinda _ .”

He spits her name like it tastes bitter on his tongue. 

“I’m sorry,” he says, and then runs.

Leta spends the next three meals with the old anger humming underneath her skin. It takes her barely more than a thought and a flick of her wrist to send everything on her tray flying. She half-expects fire to come bursting out of her again, and is grateful when it does not.

By the time the torches flicker back on, she has made up her mind: she is going to either get out of here, or die trying.

She isn't surprised to see Vinda, holding a flask in one hand and her wand -  _ her _ wand, Leta realizes - in the other. She is, however, surprised to see Aurelius with her, looking anxious.

“Accio,” Vinda says, pointing her wand at Leta's head. Leta winces as a good chunk of her hair pulls itself free. It's now or never - before she can rethink it, she reaches out and the hair zooms into her hand instead of Vinda's.

Both Vinda's and Aurelius’ eyes widen.

“You're going to have to come in here if you want it,” Leta says.

Vinda scowls and grabs the cell door. The moment she touches the handle, however, she goes flying back, crashing into the cell opposite and sliding to the floor, unconscious.

For a moment, Leta is confused. Then she see Aurelius’ outstretched wand.

“It's not right,” he says, voice stronger than Leta remembers. He looks at her. “I can get you out of here. Go back to England. You... This shouldn't have happened to you.”

Leta frowns. “You think you can break the wards?”

Aurelius’ expression goes cold. “I'm stronger than he is.”

It's not boastful. It's simply a statement of fact. Leta only has to think of her countless hours spent making light appear without her wand to understand.

She steps back from the cell door and nods. Aurelius brandishes his wand at the door, which is ripped from its hinges. Leta winces at the noise, reaching out a hand without thinking to slow the cell door's descent to the floor.

Leta drags Vinda's unconscious body into the cell, an idea already forming in her mind. She takes her wand back from Vinda, then quickly undresses the both of them. She hears a choked noise, and turns to see Aurelius facing away from her. His ears are pink.

Snorting, Leta turns back to Vinda. She puts on Vinda's clothes, which are little more than rags - probably an attempt to engender sympathy. She then dresses Vinda in her own clothes, adds a stand of her hair to the flask, and shoves it down Vinda's throat.

By the time she's finished, Aurelius looks impressed.

“I didn't think of that,” he admits.

Leta pockets her wand, feeling it almost hum with warmth at being returned to her. “What about you?” she asks.

Aurelius blinks. “What about me?”

“Aren't you coming with me?”

Aurelius opens his mouth, then closes it. Leta waits, trying to be patient, but she’s already antsy, knowing that it’s only a matter of time before Vinda comes to and starts yelling for help. Someone is bound to hear her eventually, and the Polyjuice will wear off at some point.

“...I can’t leave,” Aurelius finally says.

“You’re going to have to,” Leta points out. “You’re the one who let me go.”

“They won’t know - “

“Do you know what Queenie Goldstein is?” Leta asks. “She’s a Legilimens. She can read your mind without even trying, Aurelius. Unless you’ve somehow learned Occlumency in the past few... whatever, she’ll know, and she’ll tell Grindelwald. She might even know that I’m free already, I don’t know how strong she is.”

It becomes more and more clear that Aurelius hasn’t thought this through. “I didn’t - “

“You can’t stay here,” Leta tells him. She forces herself to calm down. “We don’t - you don’t have to come with me all the way to England, if you’d rather go somewhere else. But you can’t - I don’t think you really want to be here. It’s your decision, but... please.”

Aurelius hesitates, his eyes darting this way and that. Eventually he gives her a slow nod, tucking his wand into his pocket. Leta breathes out a sigh of relief, and lets him lead the way out of the dungeon.

* * *

By some miracle, they aren’t stopped on their way out of the castle (of course Grindelwald has his own castle,  _ of course he does _ ). Leta walks with confidence and poise, in spite of how weak she’s become. Even though she was fed regularly, they weren’t the most substantial meals. She has to keep herself from blinking, as she still isn’t used to daylight.

Leta feels the moment they pass through the wards. She offers her arm to Aurelius, who takes it with a look of trepidation.

“Where to?” she asks.

“Anywhere but here,” Aurelius replies, with more conviction than before. It’s as though the air of the castle itself had been weighing him down. 

Leta smiles, and with a crack, they’re gone.

**Author's Note:**

> I feel bad for putting Leta through even more bullshit, but assume that after this fic she's happy and gets married and never feels lonely EVER AGAIN. Because fuck that noise.
> 
> With regards to her wandless magic, my thought is that she gets it from her mother. Since she never knew her mother, she wouldn't have known to train it.


End file.
